Humanistic Therapies Therapy is as unique and diverse as the people who seek it. There are many types of therapy that are used to treat different kinds of problems. There is no perfect or absolute form of therapy, because therapy varies for each person. One of the branches of therapy is humanistic therapy. This therapy is considered an insight therapy, along with psychoanalytic therapies. However, there are differences between humanistic and psychoanalytic therapy. Humanistic therapy focuses on self-development, personal growth and responsibilities. This type of therapy guides the client to find their own answers. The therapy focuses on emotional awareness: how the person feels versus why that person feels that way (Oltmanns & Emery, 2012). …show more content…
A gestalt typically has two or more parts that are combined together to be perceived as one. In gestalt therapy, self-awareness is important for the client to comprehend. It helps them achieve personal growth and also helps them develop their full potential. Gestalt counseling is a humanistic, process-oriented therapy that integrates dialogue and field theory (Lewin, 1951). Many gestalt therapist believe that self-actualization cannot fully be achieved if negative thought patterns and behaviors intrude their daily lives. A gestalt therapist focuses on five key concepts when counselling a client. The five concepts are respect, experience, creativity, responsibility, and relationship. In a session, the client is treated with upmost respect and warmness so that he or she will be open to talk. When speaking to a client, a therapist may put emphasis on reliving past experiences to come into terms with root conflictions that are the cause of their problems. Therapist also use various creative and flexible techniques to help a client to feel safe to talk. An emphasis on social responsibility is enforced by the therapist to the client. This emphasis on social responsibility helps the client to view the world as a whole rather than focusing on only their own factors in life. Having good relationships with other people is vital for the well-being of a client. A gestalt therapists acknowledges that their client has achieved whole well-being when the client has a good relationship with themselves and others (Counselling Directory, p.3). Typical methods and techniques for a client’s therapeutic process includes role play, the “open-chair” technique, authentic dialogue, dream interpretation, and attention to body language. Gestalt therapy values each client's unique context and diversity variables and strives to understand the client's experience from his or her perspective (Resnick,
Major contributor to Gestalt therapy are two couples Fritz Pearls,Laura Posner Pearls and Earving and Miriam Polster. The Polsters theory incorporated aspects of support and acceptance between the therapist and the client. Pearls had two major goals in therapy one being helping people accept parts of themselves that they disowned and begin finding resources from within to make it through their issues versus using external resources. Gestalt is a German word that literally means whole or completion (Corey,196). Specifying the difference between many part together versus one whole. Gestalt therapy focuses on the here and now basing its experiments in physiological and existential thoughts. In this theory people are not just products of their environment but extensions of their environments (Corey,194). In a Gestalt approach session clients are asked to become aware of themselves and their experience in the present moment. In grounding themselves in the present they can change their current situation. The past is gone and the future is not yet come but the present is a time in which the client is in control of.
The rapport and friendship built throughout this movie is vital to the success of the therapy exhibited here. This is a great example of Gestalt therapeutic approach and helps to identify most of the techniques incorporated. The techniques and ways of gently confronting but pushing a client all the way through are very beneficial to each viewer of this film.
This is accomplished by three levels of involvement. The first level is working. Working in Gestalt Therapy refers to engaging in exercises or experiments that are encouraged by the therapist. Working will generally reveal something about the existence of the client. The second level is sharing. Sharing occurs after the exercise or experiments has revealed awareness of the client’s problem. The therapist encourages the client to face or contact the problem in the here and now. The third level is exploring. Exploring may occur when the client is unable or unwilling to talk about a problem but is willing to engage with the therapist in dialog. Exploring is typically a stage where the therapist identifies the client’s specific behaviors in the moment and has the client exaggerate the behaviors by working to reveal the underlying feeling that exposes the problem. The goal of Gestalt Therapy is to create sufficient awareness that empowers the client to become the solution to their own problem by identifying how they are affecting themselves and the environment around them as a result of past problems or trauma (Harman, 1974; Ikehara,
This integrative approach focuses mainly on four approaches: psychoanalytic, Adlerian, cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), and the postmodern approaches. The main focus is on CBT and how psychoanalytic, Adlerian and the postmodern approaches build on this integrative approach. In this integrative approach, the problem at hand is a client dealing with depression. I chose CBT as the main approach because the cognitive thought pattern is an important key for a client and CBT can branch out to other approaches, without interfering with the key concepts.
This involves the patient talking to a clinician about various stressors in their lives, such as environmental, work, or family related stressors. Other names for this therapy include talk therapy, or counseling. Various subtypes of psychotherapy are used, such as cognitive behavioral therapy, mindfulness techniques(in which an individual becomes aware of current behaviors, and mindfully changes them on a daily basis), and dialectic behavior therapy(where individuals write down thoughts or feelings in a journal). (Mayo Clinic et al.,
The dynamics of clinical relationships and the client’s progress in therapy can vary based on theoretical or therapeutic approaches and individual client preferences. Therefore, the driving force behind successful or lack there of treatment is largely dependent on the client’s wants and what they hope to achieve or not in treatment. Therapy can be an ongoing work in progress for a client, that can last many years, can be said to be indefinite, while for others its short lived as they took what they needed out of therapy. Some clients may sporadically come and go from treatment. Some clients may enter treatment as resistant, unwilling, and uncompliant to various approaches. According to McCarthy & Archer (2013), Freud would attribute such resistance,
Existential psychotherapy is based on a series of existential theses, proposing identification to existential anxieties/ crisis and internal ontological rebalancing through personal/ human growth. Gestalt psychotherapy proposes achievement the convergence between consciousness/ behavior and experience, "between the figure and background" (Wheeler, 1991, 65), while positive psychotherapy is based on the belief that all people are fundamentally good and they have the constitutional capacity to be happy (Seligman and Csikszentmihalyi, 2000, Seligman, 2002). Also, Group methods and techniques are increasingly used in social work. Especially in the clinical social work it is, also, used transactional analysis, the psychotherapy focused on emotions,
155). The role of the therapist is to help clients take responsibility for their actions and behaviors and to discontinue putting the blame on others. They help individuals who have limited awareness and lead a restrictive existence, assume responsibility for their role in the world (Corey, 2013, p. 155). There are three phases to this therapeutic approach. Phase one is clarifying their assumptions about the world by examining their morals, values, and beliefs. During phase two clients are encouraged to engage in self-exploration that could lead to new attitudes and values. The final phase focuses on helping the client with the information they have learned about themselves and put them into action (Corey, 2013, p. 158). The existential the client initiates the conversation there is no reason not to explore that path.
Gestalt therapy emphasizes awareness of self and others in relationships (Sharf, 2012, 245). It also focuses on one’s current situation and ability to take responsibility for it (Sharf, 2012, 252). I really liked learning about this therapy, because I feel like it can be utilized at my workplace, a prison setting. Inmate patients we receive have a very hard time accepting responsibility for how they got to us, and in jail, in the first place. They also struggle immensely with building relationships and maintaining relationships both in prison and outside of it.
When you first meet someone, the first thing you notice about them is their personality. They way they carry themselves or how they proceed to talk to you can give you insight as to what kind of person they are. Every single person on the planet has a different personality, and that is what makes us all unique in our own way. According to the American Psychological Association, personality is defined as an individual's differences in characteristic patterns such as thinking, feeling and behavior (“Personality” 2016). In class, I learned a lot about personality and the many different theories that early researchers came up with. There are two theories that I most agree with and that fit into my personality and beliefs would be, Freud’s psychodynamic theory and Rogers humanistic theory. Both of these theories have given me a better understanding on my own personality and the way I carry myself.
Furthermore, a Gestalt therapeutic approach was used in this case study because it allowed the client to learn that recovery was possible. Although the client was coping with the pain, it was certainly not the best way. Therapy gave the client insight into what needed to change to move on from that suffering. It was important that the client realized that there are other ways to look at this situation and cope with it. I believe Gestalt therapy worked well with the client’s situation mainly because she became aware of her behaviors and understand why she would do them. For instance, due to past experiences, Chelsea allowed others to dictate what she should do and feel, resulting in the lack of confidence. This approach guided the client to understand that she is the one responsible for her emotions and how to view her situation
It helps many people to find their strength and to help them use those strengths to better themselves. This group of people often refers to Maslow’s “Hierarchy of Needs”. They can see breaks in the pyramid, which can cause the hardships of anxiety. The pyramid works step by step up the pyramid starting at the lowest point, being physiological needs. It then continues up the pyramid through safety, love and belonging, ones self esteem, and ending at self-actualization. The humanistic view, in full can be described as a “crucial opportunity to lead us to our own healthy path”. In a humanistic therapy session the therapist uses a lot of empathy and hard listening. This allows the client to voice their concerns without the pressure of answering questions. But the therapists do help a lot too. With the help of humanistic therapist, the individual will learn to add or find positive experiences in their life. It can help those individuals find a sort of peace with who they are and with what
Personality, which is defined as the unique and relatively stable ways in which people think, feel, and behave, is something that is quite difficult to gauge and measure-something that is to be expected, considering it is somewhat of an abstract concept-however, psychologists have developed four different perspectives of personality as a way to “measure” personality; those four perspectives are as follows: the psychoanalytic perspective-whose main focal point is on the role of the unconscious mind in the development of personality, the behaviorist perspective-which focuses mainly on the effect a particular environment has on a person’s behavior, the humanistic perspective-which focuses primarily on the conscious life experiences and choices
Fritz and Laura Perls are responsible for the founding of gestalt therapy in the 1940’s. From there on, Gestalt has contributed significantly to the field of psychotherapy, counseling, and personal development. When therapist uses this method, his or her ultimate aim is to ensure the client achieves personal growth and development. To achieve this outcome, gestalt utilizes existential philosophy and phenomenology. In summary, this form of therapy aims to empower the patient to use his internal and external senses for the purposes of developing personal responsibility and a self-supportive system (Franzke 1999; Corcoran & Daly 2008).
We may have learned a great deal from past mistakes, but we still have a great deal of research to complete in order to further increase the effectiveness of various therapies. Psychologists now recognize that there are numerous disorders and that each may require a completely separate type of therapy. This realization has resulted in numerous specialties and areas of focus. Indeed the term ‘clinical psychology’ is now too simple and overgeneralizing. Therapists may specialize in Humanistic therapy, a type of therapy centered on the client reaching self-actualization. Another therapist might specialize in Cognitive Behavioral therapy, where they might encourage a client to dissect thoughts and feelings with the intent of changing behavior. We are at an exciting time in Clinical Psychology because we have so many resources: we can analyze our past, recognizing the heritage of clinical practice, while simultaneously recognizing new therapeutic techniques and new specialties. In the end, as long as practitioners continue to improve the experience of the client, this forward movement will strengthen our practice, and in turn, strengthen society as a